Dimity Reed

Dimity Reed (born 1942, Parkes, New South Wales, Australia) is an architect, urbanist and academic. She has been involved in government advisory roles, as well as writing for both The Sun and The Age newspapers.

Early life Dimity Reed was born in 1942 in Parkes, New South Wales,

Education Dimity was schooled at Melbourne Girls Grammar School in South Yarra and later undertook a Bachelor of Architecture at Melbourne University immediately after secondary school. She married towards the end of her second year of the degree and was pregnant with her first child by the start of the fifth, causing her to put her architectural career on hold. She returned to study 10 years later, after giving birth to her three children, completing a Masters of Architecture at RMIT University. She used her new role to get younger architects involved in the institute (much like her housing commission work) and promoting their works and new philosophies on the city of Melbourne, introducing a new chapter of the RAIA and architecture within Melbourne.

Since then Dimity has worked on a series of commissions and panels, notably the Shrine of Remembrance Trustees for the new underground 'Galleries of Remembrance' of which it was paramount in commissioning ARM for the project.

Notable projects Despite working as a practising architect with her own practice, Dimity has predominantly been involved in the urban planning realm, acting as an architectural advisor on a lot of planning and government boards. As well as providing architectural discussions in Melbourne’s local papers and collaborative publications, she also served as the head of design at RMIT and a professor of urban design.

Dimity was also an elected Councillor with the City of St Kilda (1992-1994) and as a Commissioner of the City of Moreland (1994-1996) In 2006, the state government pledged $290 million to revitalise Dandenong in partnership with VicUrban and the Greater City of Dandenong. “Renovating a vast city follows the same process as renovating a house; it’s just that the implications are far-reaching, the costs are of a different order and the time lines stretch into the future”.

Though she is now retired from the architectural sphere, Dimity is still very active on the homeground board (a no-income housing initiative) and heads up her own film production company, Mad Women Films in conjunction with her two filmmaker sons.

They have recently released a series of films of Wagner's four Ring operas. Alex Chernov said "While there are a number of recordings and analyses of the Ring Cycle, I understand that no-one has yet explained on screen how Wagner used the music to tell his complex story, how each character and each event has a musical motif that recurs throughout the four operas. All four episodes were produced in Melbourne by director Sam Reed and producer Professor Dimity Reed who worked with Professor Lees. In the result their work makes a valuable contemporary contribution to the array of material dedicated to the Ring Cycle".

Publications

ABZ of Pregnancy, co-authored with Professor Carl Wood. Nelson, 1972 Exploring Language: Senior English, co-authored with Judith Womersley. Harcourt Brace and Jovanovich Exploring Language: A Stretch of the Imagination, co-authored with Judith Womersley. Harcourt Brace and Jovanovich Member Order of Australia for contribution to Urban Design, to affordable housing and to sustainable housing, 2006